THE Tanzania Investment Bank (TIB) has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with Small Industries Development Organisation (SIDO) on development of industrial areas, including infrastructure to support Small and Medium Entrepreneurs (SMEs).

The agreement opens a new chapter on improving and developing industrial areas in various parts of the country, beginning with Dar es Salaam Region before scalling up the project up country.

The TIB Managing Director, Mr Peter Noni, said that the aim of the partnership was to help SMEs to find conducive and affordable areas for production. "As an investment bank, we have seen the hardships SMEs are facing whenever they try to start up an investment for the purpose of production.

We will only succeed in fighting against poverty if we will increase production and for an SME operator to do that, he or she must be able to access loans from banks. "Our bank has been trying to reach entrepreneurs across the country in order to provide loans aimed at supporting their businesses, but many of them fail to meet the criteria.

This is because many SMEs are considered not to be creditworthy because of lack of traceability and other requirements needed as collateral. "In understanding this condition, our bank in collaboration with SIDO has come up with a strategy to enable SMEs to overcome this challenge.

We have agreed to start working together to find areas which will be allocated for the construction of industrial areas and improve the already existing ones by providing required infrastructure which will enable small scale producers to find a cheaper conducive place to hire according to his/her need. We believe this will greatly cut down on their cost of production," he said.